Why Philosophy?

Hey guys, welcome back to my blog, I hope everyone is well! I have been a bit of a mess lately, I have had a maths test and so much schoolwork and sports commitments and I think I've been going a bit insane. Originally I was going to write a post on the importance of a big fat cry because lately I have been super on top of my work and organised on the outside but it cost me my mental and even physical health. I have been struggling to sleep and even eating makes me feel sick because I was a constant bundle of nerves for literally no reason. It then made my upper back, shoulder and neck problems so much worse to the point I physically could not sit without being on the verge of tears. Take this as your sign to go take a break and do some of the things you love because when it gets to a point that's unsalvageable, it can lead to many worse problems. Anyways, onto the actual post:

What is Philosophy?

The actual word 'philosophy' means love of wisdom. I wish I would be able to give you an actual definition as to what philosophy is, but, so many philosophers have written books trying to explain what it is because even the simple question as 'what is philosophy?' is a philosophical topic itself.

Philosophy is everything, because quite literally everything has a philosophical meaning behind it. If you keep on pressing the first link on any wikepedia page, it will lead you to the philosophy wikepedia page. That's because no matter what subject we study or what we learn, if you have a true passion for any subject, you keep asking questions. Each question has an answer which has arbitrary value but what happens when you get to the end of that chain of questions? Everything has to have an end at some point but most questions within regular subjects end with the agreement that we'll never know the intrinsic truth of the world and people studying those subjects tend to be satisfied with that answer.

On the other hand, the start of philosophy is at the end of other subjects. The questions asked within philosophical conversation tend to be along the lines of 'how do we know that 1 plus 1 ACTUALLY equals 2?' we simply agree and follow the knowledge we are told from schools, institutions, parents, friends, teachers but how do we know any of it is actually true?

The study of philosophy is the study of truth. The study of truth behind anything, whether it be the truth of rational things such as mathematical equations or the truth behind slightly irrational things such as trying to prove we aren't in the matrix.

School is great at telling us what true facts are but we never debate what truth is. Aristotle once wrote an excellent definition of what truth is. He said 'To say of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not' and while this may seem confusing, what he's trying to say is that if I were to say that water is clear, and water is actually clear, then I speak the truth. 

Aristotle equates the word truth with 'to be'. If truth is linked with the concept of 'being' then we are all familiar with it. We are all human BEings and we all are BEing right now. If our entire lives revolve around truth, how many truths do we actually know? We know that the sky is blue, or that 1+1=2 but what about questions like 'how do we know we are not in the matrix?'. Most people would say we don't know. This means there is a possibility we aren't, in which case, nothing needs to be questioned. But, there is a possibility we may be in the matrix, and if this is true, then even things such as 1+1=2 needs to be questioned because how do we know it isn't simply something a machine is telling us? How would we ever know the truth unless we question our lives? 

I believe in common sense. The fact that killing someone for no reason is immoral which tells us that there are certain morals that we as a society should follow. The same common sense tells me that 1+1 does in fact = 2 which could be applied to the idea that we aren't in the matrix by deducing things down to common sense. However, common sense can only take us so far and there are some things even common sense cannot explain.

I could probably go on forever but time to wrap things up here, essentially, philosophy is truth and the study of understanding knowledge.

Why Do I Want To Do Philosophy?

I mean if my huge talk above doesn't explain my passion for learning and wanting to keep learning more and more, I don't know what will. I want to study philosophy because of my love for knowledge, and not just knowledge such as biology or chemistry. I could have easily picked subjects which could let me study medicine or engineering or something which could lead me to having a set plan in life but I feel like nowadays, people find the concept of studying just for the pure enjoyment of a subject incredibly strange and even a waste of money (many people have told me this in regards to me wanting to do a philosophy degree). People find it weird when I tell them the only reason I want to study philosophy is because I find it's such a fulfilling subject. Not just fulfilling for my academic life but fulfilling in every aspect of my life.

I think it is an innate thing for everyone to philosophise things but we are distracted by the outside world and material things. If a person was kept in a singular room their entire life with absolutely no contact or knowledge with the outside world, then it is simply human nature to question things such as 'Why am I here?' Studying philosophy allows me to connect with the root of being human and simply just being. 

People always ask me what a philosopher actually does. While you may thing they just get high and write books (which is correct to some extent) my dad has always told me a philosopher is a person who has ideas and puts them into practice. This means everyone, to some degree, is a philosopher. Everybody has ideas in life and everybody puts them into action, even someone like Jeff Bezos. He had an idea which was to make Amazon, and he put it into practice. There is philosophy behind everything, even if you may be someone who believes only in science or facts. 

That went on for a bit longer than anticipated but I can't help it, I just really love the subject and honestly could go on for so long. I don't generally talk that much about philosophical things with my friends because some of them find it utter bs and I always feel like I would talk too much or bore people by it so this is really the only place I can let all my thoughts run wild. I hope you enjoyed this week's post, I promise next week I''ll write about something a bit more general that more of my readers will enjoy. See you soon, love you guys <33